New Chinese Bridge vs. Bridge Repair in San Francisco: Which Project is Well-Built, On Time and On Budget?

: The world’s longest over-water bridge has just been completed by the Chinese……IN FOUR YEARS….for $11.1 billion.

Now let’s compare the Chinese bridge-building acumen to the very best that America has to offer in bridge-building right now:: : The shameful, obscenely-expensive replacement of the east span of the San Francisco Bay bridge.

No longer dependent on western expertise for such sophisticated projects, the six-lane road bridge is supported by more than 5,200 columns and was designed by the Shandong Gausu Group. When it opens to traffic later this year, the bridge is expected to carry over 30,000 cars a day and will cut the commute between the city of Qingdao and the sprawling suburb of Huangdao by between 20 and 30 minutes. :

At least 10,000 workers toiled in two teams around the clock to build the bridge, which was constructed from opposite ends and connected in the middle in the last few days. A staggering 450,000 tons of steel was used in its construction — enough for almost 65 Eiffel Towers — and 2.3 million cubic metres of concrete, equivalent to filling 3,800 Olympic-sized swimming pools.: :

Chinese officials said that the bridge will be strong enough to withstand a magnitude 8 earthquake, typhoons or the impact of a 300,000 tonne vessel.

Now let’s enter the engineering “twilight zone” that is San Francisco, California

A 50-foot piece of the east span of the San Francisco Bay Bridge collapsed a during the 1989 earthquake. It is now the year 2011. The “repair” to the bridge has now “bloomed” into a full-fledged new eastern section.: : Someone required: : a new temporary section of bridge: : to be : built.: : The final bridge section : MAY be done in 2014, will cost $6.3 billion “officially,”: but actually will cost at LEAST a staggering$12 billion at completion, due to the costs of debt service, which are not included in “official” estimates given to the news media.:

Salt in the wound:: : Alexis Madrigal of the Atlantic shows, by comparison, what a little snip of a thing the San Francisco Golden Gate bridge is when lined up with the new Qingdao bridge, which is longer than a marathon.

P.S.: : Someone do the math and tell me how much per foot or per INCH the San Francisco Bay bridge will cost. I might faint over my calculator.